


Never

by Slaves_of_Yesterday



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Grindelwald in prison, M/M, Young Albus Dumbledore, kinda sad albus, old Gellert Grindelwald, switched places in time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-09-01 11:57:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16764688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slaves_of_Yesterday/pseuds/Slaves_of_Yesterday
Summary: Dumbledore changes his place with his older self. He doesn't really care how it happened as where to find Grindelwald to ask him some questions.





	Never

**Author's Note:**

> Based on Fantastic Beast characters (pre-COG) so I gave old Grindelwald different eye colours even though in HP movie (books) he was blue eyed.

Albus blinked in shock and confusion as the world around him shifted and changed. He had to hold the nearby chair to keep his balance. One moment he was in an empty classroom, as all students just left his lecture and the other he was in the headmaster’s office. Is it yet another of the students’ pranks? In his mind appeared few names of boys and even of one girl who could do it. He cursed and swore to discipline them as soon as he finds them. Albus placed the tips of his fingers to his temples and closed his eyes for a second.

A shriek woke him up from his thoughts. He slowly turned around to see the source of it and there, right next to the pile of books by the table, sat an elegant bird in the colour of fire red sapphire who looked very much as an phoenix.

“I was not aware of prof. Dippet keeping you here,” mumbled Albus more for himself than to the phoenix. He tried to approach him, aware of every slow move he made just in case the bird would get startled by him, but to his utter surprise the phoenix half jumped half flew from his place to the table, where Albus was, and touched with his small head Albus’ stretched out hand.

The professor stared in shock at the magical creature which seemed to be almost happy to see him!

_So it is true, the phoenix comes to our family,_ though Albus admiring him. As he was carefully caressing him he took a look around the office. He couldn't help himself but it looked somehow…. Different. In the corner next to the door was a cabinet full of books and magical object which he would swore wasn't there yesterday. Old rolls of parchment were everywhere, the desk in the middle of the office had darker shade of brown as if it was made out of a different type of wood and the paintings were slightly shifted and out of order. He took two steps back to look at the painting above the desk and gasped.

There, where should be a portrait of Phineas Nigellus Black, hangt painting of sleeping Armando Dipped, the man he spoke with just this morning. In that moment professor knew for sure that something's wrong. He walked around the desk and sat on the chair, looking through countless of books, papers, parchments and letters to find out what's going on.

He realised he's no longer in his time but somewhere or some-time in 1995. _How is that even possible? Time travel of this proportions shouldn't be…._ Albus decided to find out more informations about the time he’s in and the time that passed. At the end it took him whole noon and evening, maybe more as he wasn’t paying much attention to passing time, reading parts of _The History of Hogwarts_ or _The wizarding world during and after world wars_ to get at least a distant picture what's the current state of things. He must've been somehow thrown into his older self place, or maybe switched places with him that way he was now in his own office as the current headmaster of Hogwarts. He chuckled, he was an ambitious man but never really thought about leading this whole place. What struck him, maybe even more than finding out there was a another Dark lord, was the whole chapter dedicated to his relationship with Grindelwald, their ways of thinking, disagreements, Grindelwald's crimes and their last battle where, according to the book, Grindelwald was defeated, locked up and they never saw each other again.

Pain in his heart, frown on his face, he read through it three times, sad that it must've ended that way. That Gellert's greed for power and control led him to his end as he warned him so many times before. That it was him, who fought him there and then which meant that one of them broke the blood pact. That one of them, if not both, were prepared and determined to hurt or even worse, kill each other.

A single tear fell from the corner of his eye as he closed the book, resting his now heavy head in his hands. He can't change what happened, and he knew, that even if he gets back into his time and place with all the knowledge, he won't be able to act different way. The day will come when he will have to fight his loved one and the only thing he can do is to prepare psychically. He was reviewing all those pages he's seen up to now finding one information, the most important: _is he still alive?_ Nowhere has he seen the date of his death or the place of his last rest.

As soon as that idea crossed his mind he knew it was a wrong thing to do but he had to. He had to see him, the future him, and ask him about that day or more likely to see if he is still the same or changed. If he was worth it, if he, maybe, redeemed himself at the end.

(...)

He left a note in his office so that other professors won't be looking for him in next week or so. From what he understood in the letters he read, he- the older he leaves from now and then for some business in or outside the country, it's not unusual for him to disappear for few days without barely anyone knowing. What will be considerably harder will be to get to Grindelwald's cell without being spotted. He knew that the blonde wizard is most likely alone in the whole Nurmengard castle. What an irony, the fortress he used to own now owns him.

It took him two days, or at least that's what he thought, his perception of time was gone as he was trying so hard to find the way in and out, before he was finally standing in the last dark and cold corridors out of many, he knew it. Only few meters further was the cell where _he_ was held! Although he tried to keep calm his heart was of other mind, curiously beating faster than it was usual. Beating in the same pace it beat every time he was about to meet his lover from time long ago.

Dumbledore took a deep breath and moved to the cell finding a figure of an old mean in the simplest clothes sitting on the cold floor. He looked somewhat starved and weak. The beautiful blond hair he used to have were gone. Time has changed his features so much that Albus would barely recognise him. Grindelwald's blind stare was situated somewhere towards the wall in front of him. He didn’t seem to have noticed his presence.

"Gellert…?" broke Albus the silence. Even though he wasn’t loud it seemed as the name was echoing in the stone space. The imprisoned wizard jerked his head turning it to see who’s speaking. The mismatched eyes looked at the younger man. _Oh those eyes!_ Even if Grindelwald aged fifty more years those eyes wouldn’t change a bit. The only thing that was absent was the fire in them.

"Well this one you haven’t use for a long time," sarcasm mirroring in Grindelwald's voice. "Almost got him right, not like the last time that you presented him with that squeaky voice. What have I done this time? Stop with those illusions, it’s getting old."

Albus frowned, puzzled for a moment. _He must think I’m an illusion…_ It was somewhat logical given to the fact he should be way older. But was this part of his sentence? Seeing illusions of people he knew? He had no idea but in some way it was good for him. As long as the older man’s thinking that he’s an illusion, nobody will ever know that he’s here. On the other hand, he will tell nothing to an illusion. Maybe it’s better that way, too much knowledge is not always a good thing.

"You did so many things wrong, but I would rather remembered those good things you did, we did," the kindness in his own words surprised him. "All the good I wanted for you but you never listened..."

"I could say the same thing. If you… If Albus ever listened to me I would never end up here." Grindelwald broke the eye contact as if the wall was more interesting than a painful reminder of his ‘youth’. Albus decided to play his part as if he wasn’t there.

"Maybe he listened more than you thing and saw the foolishness of your deeds." Silence. "He wanted to protect you from yourself but what chance did you give him? Only making it harder and harder every time until there was no coming back." Albus made a pause, closed his eyes for a moment. The silent treatment that was given to him wasn’t pleasant at all. But he knew that as soon as he would start demanding answers to his questions Grindelwald would stubbornly kept silence. He pace to the other side of the cell thinking whether he should ask more burning questions. "Why did you destroy the bloodpact?"

Grindelwald's eyes found his again. As far as Albus was concerned nobody knew about said promise between them. If the question confused or surprised the sitting wizard he didn’t show it. He blinked slowly as a cat. "I didn’t," corners of his lips rose a little in pittoresque smile.

So then Albus did, or he will. Things will go really serious for him when he comes back and he wasn’t sure if he was prepared. He didn’t feel so good. Ant those eyes piercing right through him weren’t helping at all. There was one last thing he wanted to ask, apart of those thousand questions that he knew would be left unanswered. "Were you so determined to do anything just to see your truth to win?" Albus closed his eyes. "Would you kill him to see your empire rise?"

He opened his eyes again but Grindelwald didn’t move for an inch still staring at him as if he was wearing a mask. The younger man waited for what seemed as en eternity. Every heartbeat making the humming of blood in his ears louder and his body weaker. He clenched his hands in a fists, took a deep breath and while giving up waiting for an answer he managed to move with his left leg forward, leaving.

The blood in his ears was louder than the sound of his steps through the stone hallway. Maybe he was just imagining it, desperately wishing for it, or he really heard that. Faint sound of only one word coming from behind his back.

"Never."

**Author's Note:**

> This was my first fanfic after five years and first ever written in English. I had no one to do the beta so I believe there are mistakes, sorry for that. I would love to hear any critique concerning the story itself or the grammatical site of this work. Thank you so much for reading it all the way down here.


End file.
